Getting your family on TV

Best Of Google TV Series

As the holidays get into full swing, I am spending more and more time with my extended family, getting in to all kinds of hi-jinks. Like any self-respecting embarrassing dad, I find love capturing these precious moments by making tons of great little videos and taking even more photos. I no longer need any fancy equipment to do this – most smart-phones now take great photos and videos (I love my Nexus S, if you're interested.)

The best part is that we can all slump on the sofa and re-live the best moments on my TV whenever we want, because it's powered by Google TV. In the not-so-distant past, your family would only get on TV if they were (un)lucky enough to get onto a TV show. More recently, you would have to find the right lead, plug your high-end camera into your TV and navigate though impossible menus and settings.

Now, you don't need any fancy equipment to do this, either – the media player app can play most media files that are plugged into the device (on a thumb-drive, for example) or streamed across the local network from a DLNA device like a PC or smart-phone.

My preference is to do a little editing, then save the best photos and videos to a Picasa Web Album, which I can do straight from my phone. Using the Gallery app on my TV, which syncs to Picasa, I immediately have a slide-show on a 46" photo-frame right in the living room. We've had a lot of fun using Picnik to add silly effects to our photos, which can be done from TV, phone, or anywhere.

I tend to upload the very best videos to YouTube, so that the world can share my family inanity. Watching these in Leanback mode on TV makes it feel like we've almost got our own TV channel – it's even in HD, which is pretty incredible for something recorded on a phone.

The most important point is that you don't need to use the same services I do. Because Google TV has a full web browser, it can access any website you want to use. For example Flickr looks great on the big screen and Vimeo Couch Mode is optimized for viewing on Google TV.

It's not just limited to the family member who happen to be on my sofa at that time. If you have the Logitech TV Cam, you can video chat with friends and family on the big screen (no more huddling around a tiny laptop screen). Next, I'm going to try using Qik to live stream from my phone to a TV - kind of like a live broadcast, right?

Posted by Larry Yang, Google TV Product Team

News from any source

Best of Google TV Series

Television is stil the main source for the daily news in the home, according to PEW research. Until lately, print and web news content have been absent from the big screen. We’ve been working with developers to enhance your TV news experience, optimizing both traditional and innovative news sources for Google TV.

• The New York Times offers daily TimesCast video-news updates alongside video blogs and featurettes.
• USA Today has improved reading for the big screen: you can browse through the day in photos, stay up-to-date on sports news, and track the world of business.
• The CNBC News App lets you watch the latest web videos in business news. Follow the markets as they happen and track your personal, customized stock portfolio.
• The Huffington Post brings together the best of traditional news, the blogosphere and opinion reporting in their sleek News Glide web-app.
• The Onion covers “the important stories lesser outlets fail to report” through their comedic style.

Video journalism has also proliferated across YouTube. On YouTube Leanback, viewers have access to rich content from channels like the Associated Press, Al-Jazeera English, and NPR. Alongside traditional news sources, YouTube has built a thriving community of citizen reporters. The News & Politics channel, CitizenTube, aggregates video news from across the YouTube community, providing raw footage from the scene of breaking news and unique perspectives from people and places around the world.

On Google TV you can get breaking news from many sources: cable broadcast, the web, blogs, and even citizen journalists.

Posted by Olivia Ma, YouTube News Manager, recently watched Google TV Entry - Stop Motion Animation

Google TV On campus

(Cross-posted on the Google Student Blog)

Google TV has been popping up on college campuses across the country. We’re coordinating with the Google Student Ambassador Program and University Programs to share Google TV with students and faculty.

This initiative began last semester when Google Student Ambassadors hosted Google TV study breaks on over thirty campuses. The ambassadors had students compete to win Sony Internet TVs for their friends and school. They hosted pizza breaks, tech challenges, YouTube marathons and of course, college football viewing parties. The top seven most creative study breaks won two Sony Internet TVs to give back to their college as a reward for their school spirit and enthusiasm for Google TV.

The momentum from the Google TV study breaks has carried over into the classroom. Already, the web on TV has proven itself as a great platform for for early education and reading skills with web apps like PBS Kids and Meegenius. However, professors have expressed interest in expanding these opportunities to all levels of learning.

That is why we are announcing Google TV for EDU, a seeding program to support university research. Google TV for EDU asks campuses around the country: how can educators enhance the Web on TV for the classroom. Specifically, we’re asking faculty how their research could:

• Generate new interest in television engineering
• Make computer science tangible for students
• Help in the development of smart TV curricula and new educational tools
• Contribute to in-classroom and distance learning over television
• Reach a wide audience

We officially launched the program yesterday to select university faculty with experience and leadership in television. These select faculty will receive a Logitech Revue to carry out their research in the classroom. Over the next few months we’ll be posting outcomes of their research as well as information on new educational web-apps.

Posted by Miriam Schneider, Product Marketing Manager

Samsung and Google TV

Earlier this week, we shared that Vizio is working on several devices powered by Google TV. Today, Samsung also announced that they’re building a 3D Blu-ray player and companion box with Google TV. Check out their press release for more details. We look forward to working closely with all of our partners to bring Google TV powered devices to more consumers this year.

Posted by Mickey Kim, Google TV Partnerships Team

Google TV: A new partner for the new year

We’re back from the holidays and ready to get crackin’ on 2011. Last year, we launched the first version of Google TV with our partners Sony and Logitech, and this year, we'll continue to make the product even better for you. As we shared last month, we’re constantly iterating on Google TV, adding new features and content, improving the user experience, and fixing bugs. We are in the early stages, and the future is bright.

Today I'm excited to share that we're kicking off the year with a new partner, Vizio, a leading TV maker in the U.S. Vizio is making a new line of TVs and a Blu-ray player incorporating Google TV that will hit shelves later this year.

Also in 2011, we plan to bring developers tools for building applications specifically for the TV and living room, and we plan to bring Android Market to Google TV, so consumers can download thousands of applications to their TVs. Check back in with us periodically to see the latest from our team and partners.

Posted by Rishi Chandra, Google TV Product Manager